Memory

Well, I finally spoke to someone at the CDC in regards to the random survey letter they sent out notifying participants of their voluntary immunization telephone survey. Although I was happy to help such an important institution, I was also curious to analyze their research survey. Here are some of my observations. Firstly, I was told that the survey should take about 15 minutes, when in essence it took about 23 minutes in total. I found this particularly disturbing because I thought that the woman who I was speaking with  spoke extremely fast; this was a unique experience coming from someone who was constantly reminded by her entire family throughout high school to slow down and speak slower. Another item I didn't appreciate was that most of the questions did not pertain to my 3 year old's actual immunizations, even though the CDC's letter did state that this would happen to a certain extent. I felt misinformed. Some of the aspects that I did appreciate was the fact that at the very beginning, I was clearly told that this was voluntary, that the information I provided would be protected, and that everything was being recorded. Also, the phone survey allowed me to ask certain questions to be clarified by a real person, whereas in a written survey the participant does not have the ability to do this and may answer incorrectly without meaning to. Overall, I found the survey to be a great learning experience in regards to research surveys.

One of the focuses in Representing Youth this week was the idea of how memory affects a researcher, particularly when it comes to studying children. This is because most people endeavor to relate to what they are researching, and the way that this is done is through memories of one's past childhood. In fact, the author states in chapter 10 that "when I heard Mallory describe her thinking process about buying clothes - that when you go into a store, whether you have the money or not, you might buy something - I invoked memories of my contrasting adolescence".  (p. 262) Then she states that "her defense... [was] a reflection of how invisible her privilege was to her". (p. 262) Although I can truly relate to this idea, and definitely agree with it, I did find one aspect sorely missing from the overall chapter. Memory causes bias! I was unsure as to why she hadn't discussed this topic, since it's clear to me from the aforementioned case that not only did memory play an integral role in understanding Mallory, it also created a bias in understanding where Mallory was coming from. I think that an important element in researching anything, and especially youth where memory plays such a huge part, is that one has to realize that they are somewhat biased and to try to remove that bias as best as possible.

The chapter on lurking as an ethnographic method of research was particularly interesting. Last Spring semester I took a course on Web 2.0 with Lori Bell that I absolutely loved. She really educated us well in the vast realm of new social media, and one topic we covered was 'lurking'. We learned how lurkers were important to online communities, however did not contribute much in the way of socialization for others. Learning about lurking in the spring really helped me understand this chapter much better than I would have otherwise.

This week we've been focusing on posting our initial long ideas and also commenting on other classmates' ideas on gatekeepers and least-adults. Once again I feel frustrated with the lack of contribution by certain team members. Of course, at the beginning I also was unable to focus on my literature review and contribute my long initial post to the forum. However, there always seems to be those that are motivated to contribute and discuss ideas, and others that are not. Understanding that people are so different, is another great thing to keep in mind when conducting research. Although the sky may look light blue to me, my friend may call it light turquoise. Personalities play a large role in how things are done and perceived.